


Aubade

by carpenoctem22



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Abuse, F/M, or implied at least?, pacifica angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-04
Updated: 2015-04-04
Packaged: 2018-03-21 07:10:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3682797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpenoctem22/pseuds/carpenoctem22
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When a letter from her mother brings back memories Pacifica would rather forget, she's faced with confronting the past she's been ignoring for far too long. Luckily for her, she's got another family who isn't about to let her try that alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aubade

**Author's Note:**

> I really love Pacifica, you guys. That being said, I really, really hope I'm totally screwing up her character here.
> 
> This is basically just a bunch of long, messy rambles that somehow shaped itself into an actual fic, so expect lots of headcannoning and massive speculation ahead. And it's probably wildly AU, but fanfiction exists so I can give these characters a happy ending, so there. It takes place about five years or so from the first season, and is (sort-of) compliant with my other stories, so you should read those too if you have the chance :D

The lavender nail polish on Pacifica's nails glints as her fingers fly across the piano, playing notes that have long been etched into her memory. The Shack echoes with Chopin's melodies, tunes that evoke a nostalgic tugging in her chest. Dipper watches her from where he's lounging on the nearby couch, face pillowed on his elbows as his eyelids flutter lazily. Pacifica's mostly ignoring him at this point, caught up in the music, but a small smile tugs on her lips as she watches him out of the corner of her eye, his eyes drifting closed. Her fingers grow feather-light on the keys, the music softening, and Dipper's breathing evens out, slow and deep.

It's at that moment that she slams multiple keys at once, the loud, discordant sound screeching through the room. Dipper jerks awake with choked gasp, eyes wide as his head whips around wildly. He finally lands on Pacifica, still stifling giggles with her hand, and his eyes narrow.

"That was cruel," he whines, head sinking back onto the arm of the couch.

"Hey, you fell asleep during my performance," she pouts. "I thought you said you wanted to see me play."

"Of course I do," Dipper assures her, head lifting. "And it was good! Really, really good. It was just one of those soothing melodies, y'know? So really, it's a compliment that it put me to sleep, actually-"

"Or someone's been pulling all-nighters again," Pacifica interrupts smoothly. Dipper flushes. She rolls her eyes.

"Dipper, this has to stop. I didn't even know someone could have bags that dark under their eyes."

"What, you don't find the rugged, overtired look attractive?" Dipper asks playfully, batting his eyelashes at her. Pacifica shoves him.

"I find it concerning, like any normal human being should," she says, huffing. "And I'm serious. Next time you fall asleep, it's not going to be somewhere half as convenient as this. Like, in a car, or something-"

"Paz, I'll sleep, I promise," Dipper says, tugging her hand. He studies her face, frowning. "If you promise me you'll get some too. I hate to break it to you, but your makeup only covers so much."

It's Pacifica's turn to flush, rubbing beneath her eyes agitatedly.

"You're full of compliments today," she mutters, avoiding his gaze.

"Pacifica."

She bites her lip. The letter weighs heavily in her pocket, where it's crumpled into a small wad of glaring, handwritten words.

Sighing, she pulls the crumpled paper out, smoothing it on her knee. The words are crinkled and creased but still legible, and she hands it wordlessly to Dipper. She watches his expression change, first from confusion, then to shock, then to anger.

"You're kidding me."

"About this?" she says, giving a forced laugh. "Really?"

"No, I just-" Dipper shakes his head, handing her back the letter with rigid hands. "Who does she think she  _is_?"

"My mother, apparently," Pacifica says, her sarcastic bite a pathetic shade of its normal self. Dipper stares at her, then back at the letter. Then back at her.

"Well, you can tell her to go f-"

"Dipper!" Pacifica has to bite back a slight laugh at her normally gentle boyfriend's venomous outburst. "Dipper, it's not… it's not really  _that_  bad of a thing."

"Seriously?" Dipper says, looking at her disbelievingly. "She's shoving the house she  _knows_  you've got nothing but bad memories of on you and she's masking it as a  _gift_?!"

"Technically, she's calling it part of my inheritance," she says. "And it's a mansion, actually."

Dipper looks like he wants to punch something.

"Unbelievable," he mutters. "Just freaking unbelievable – aw man, Paz, I'm so sorry-"

And with that Dipper's anger evaporates, replaced by the earnest concern and worry she's come to know quite well. His fingers skirt the strands of hair nearest her face and she leans into his touch, her eyes flitting closed. He pulls her into his arms and she buries her face in his shoulder, sighing as she relaxes into his comforting warmth.

"I'm so sorry, Paz," he whispers.

"Don't be," she murmurs back, closing her eyes and burrowing further into his chest.

She wishes she could stay this way forever, hiding in Dipper's arms and staunchly ignoring everything else in the world. But she is Pacifica Northwest, and she does have her pride.

The old clock on the wall chimes, and she pulls away from Dipper regretfully.

"We should get going," she says, brushing beneath her eyes in case any of her makeup's gone astray. "Your Grunkle did say he was bringing the truck around, like, an hour ago."

"Eh, it's Grunkle Stan," Dipper says, clearly as disappointed as she is that she's pulled away. "He says ten minutes, he's back in three hours. You never know."

Pacifica snorts.

"Still," Dipper sighs, stretching as he stands. "We should probably at least  _try_  to move the piano, instead of playing it."

"Not that your playing wasn't awesome!" he adds hastily at her raised eyebrow. "Which thanks, by the way – hehe, I had no idea you'd actually do it."

"Well, I had my honor to defend," Pacifica huffs, pulling herself up with Dipper's outstretched hand. "The verdict?"

"You're  _incredibly_ musically talented, and I was very wrong," Dipper says.

"Good," Pacifica smiles.

"It really is a nice piano, though," Dipper says regretfully. "Sucks that Grunkle Stan has to ship it off to the buyers today."

"I used to have one of these, at the mansion," Pacifica says softly, running her hands over the keys. "It was beautiful - full grand piano and everything."

She swallows.

"It was my favorite thing in that place."

Dipper says nothing, but takes her hand in his and grips it firmly. She squeezes back.

* * *

Despite Dipper's insistence that statistics and demographics are always changing, Pacifica's Intro to Psychology textbook tells her that fifty percent of marriages in the U.S. end in divorce. So really, it shouldn't have surprised her when her parents joined that number.

It still did. She was so used to seeing them as a single, threatening entity, that the idea of them being on their own was unimaginable.

They split shortly after That Summer. The shock of Pacifica's rebellion, combined with the lurking threats of exposure, probably had something to do with it.

And the near-apocalypse. The whole fire-from-the-sky, national threat, our-daughter's-run-off-to-die-fighting-with-the-Pines-kids may have had a slight hand in it too. Maybe.

Whatever the reason, her parents officially split two weeks after her thirteenth birthday, her mother neatly exiting her life on a plane to New York with what barely scraped past as a goodbye. Her father had quickly followed suit, looking at business investments in Florida, and Pacifica had found herself two steps away from being dragged along.

If it hadn't been for her grandmother's offer to keep her and the suspiciously neat legal negotiating of Stanford Pines, she very might well have. But the end of the whole messy affair found her living in her grandmother's less spacious (but no less extravagant) house located on the southern end of Gravity Falls, both parents more than half a country away.

She spent a lot of nights at the Mystery Shack that year.

But those memories are ones of the past, ones she's long moved on from – or so she thought. Now, however, they're brought to the forefront of her mind again – and it's all that stupid letter's fault.

The crumpled paper in her pocket appears nothing but a harmless letter from her mother, at first. She's gotten plenty gotten plenty of those before, impersonal, cursory notes pretending to care about her well-being, typed on fancy, white paper.

That being said, it's the actual pen-and-ink handwriting that sets her off.

There's not much said in the letter – short, brief sentences informing her of her mother's new job, but there are different questions this time, short, halted musings about her future, about college, her upcoming steps into adulthood.

And then there's the final sentence, informing her that, as neither parent is planning on returning to Gravity Falls, the mansion has now been added to her inheritance – it's hers. That huge, abandoned building filled with bad memories that she hasn't set foot in for years – the building she  _hates_  – it's hers, now.

To borrow a quote from Stan Pines – hot Belgian freaking waffles.

A small part of her wants to believe that the letter is an apology of sorts. Lord only knows it's the closest thing her mother's ever going to be capable of giving – much less her father.

Pacifica doesn't like to talk about her parents. She likes to pretend that particular first part of her life didn't exist, to be honest.

The most painful part is that there are still good memories, happy ones, laced in between all the awful ones. There are images of her parents smiling and laughing –  _genuine_  smiles and laughter – snippets of conversations at the dinner table, memories of the tingling excitement when she opened up gifts, and distant, blurry memories of her mother singing her to sleep, of her father's warm hugs.

She wishes she could take those few memories, cut them out and string them together into something resembling a happy childhood. She doesn't  _want_ memories of harsh words and stinging cheeks and crushing loneliness and ringing bells. She  _hates_ those memories. She hates her parents in those memories.

She wants to hate them now. She should, she thinks. But there's that painful, traitorous part of her that clings to the scarce good memories, that wants to believe that her parents  _loved_  her, that they weren't that desperate and cold-hearted, that her childhood wasn't an ugly mess of stories that make people wince in sympathy and Mabel's eyes water as she knits her another sweater.

She just… she just  _wants_ , sometimes.

* * *

"And that's how you perfect a fake ID, kids. Just don't tell your parents about this."

"Grunkle Stan, are you sure you should be teaching us this stuff?" Mabel says, frowning at the mess of fake ID's and passports on the floor in front of her. Pacifica picks up a passport with the name 'Hal Forrester' on it, rifling through the pages emblazoned with the U.S. seal.

"Course I am!" Stan says, folding his arms. "You kids choose this life, you gotta know how to live it. And part of that is making sure your brother doesn't end up at the police station next time you go investigating a bar."

"I'm with Grunkle Stan on that one," Dipper calls from where he's sitting at the coffee table with Stanley, a mass of notes and illegal-looking documents strewn before them. "That sucked."

"There you go," Stan says, nodding at Mabel. "Keep your brother out of jail like a good sister."

"By making illegal documents that could get us into worse trouble?" Pacifica says. Stan waves his hand, unconcerned.

"It's only illegal if you get caught. And trust me, the documents I'm teachin' you to make are rock solid."

"As much as I hate to admit it, Stan's right," Stanley mutters, still poring over Dipper's notes from their latest run-in with a river ghost. "He's always had a talent for the illegal."

"Hmph," Mabel huffs, but she's eyeing the ID's with interest. "I'm only doing it if I can pick a cool name."

"Well of course," Stan says. "You're pretending to be someone else! Pick whatever you want!"

Mabel seems mollified by that, and begins writing down extravagant names, muttering under her breath. Pacifica glances back at Stan.

"So you can make fake ID's and fake passports," she muses. "You know anything about, like, pilot's licenses?"

Stan gives her a wicked grin.

"I can make a license for anything I want, kid."

"Except for marriage!" Stanley calls. Stan pales.

"Yeah. Yeah, not those. Never again," he shudders.

Pacifica decides to leave that one alone.

"Alright, alright, that's enough super secret criminal stuff for tonight," Mabel says, jumping up. "Tonight is game night!"

"Oh, no," Stan says, shaking his head. "You've got the date wrong, sweetheart-"

Mabel shoves her tiny, bright pink pocket calendar in his face, finger pointing squarely to the date labeled 'game night'.

"Hot Belgian waffles," Stan mutters. "Fine. Game night, yeah."

"Yay!" Mabel exclaims. "Soos! C'mon, it's time for game night!"

"Already on it, Hambone," Soos says, emerging from the hallway with the monopoly box.

Pacifica and Stan's sighs are matching as Mabel dumps the contents of the box on the floor in her enthusiasm. Ah, well. If you can't beat 'em.

"I call the car," Pacifica says, snatching it up.

"Hey!" Stan protests. "That's my piece!"

"First caller gets piece!" Mabel says cheerily. "Speaking of which, I'll take the dog."

"Hey!" Soos objects.

Mabel ignores him, eyes narrowing at the remaining members of the family.

"And you two!" Stanley and Dipper freeze, notes still in their hands as they stare warily at Mabel. "Drop the nerd stuff! Game night is a mandatory requirement for all!"

Dipper makes a face, but quickly gets up as he's met by twin glares from Mabel and Pacifica. Stanley sighs resignedly, placing the notes down carefully and following suit.

"Sit by me, Gran!" Mabel tells her grandfather, patting the empty space of carpet beside her.

"Mabel, sweetheart, I thought I asked you to stop calling me that," Stanley says, a brief, pained look flashing across his face. "Please."

"But it works so well, though!" Mabel exclaims. "Gran and Stan!"

"Yeah, it's perfect,  _Granny_ ," Stan says, a wide smirk plastered on his face. His brother takes the opportunity to whack him squarely in the head with the journal as he sits.

Pacifica's smiling at the duo when she hears Dipper come up behind her. A familiar weight presses onto her head as he slaps his hat on her, shooting her a grin as he sits besides her. Pacifica just rolls her eyes, smiling at the noticeable indent the hat's left in his brown curls.

"Alright, folks, let's get this game started," Stan says, dealing out the multi-colored money. "And if anyone doesn't have a will they'd better draw it up now, because we're all probably gonna end up murdering each other by the end of this."

"I'm leaving everything to Waddles' children!" Mabel says cheerily, already arranging her money into a multi-colored face.

The game starts and, quite thankfully, it's not nearly as violent as Stan's prepared for. It does, however, dissolve into chaos as Mabel decides to rob Dipper's account, leaving her twin to snatch at her money with vengeful exclamations.

Pacifica smiles at the chaos.  _This_  is her family, she thinks. This is the one she wants.

And sitting amongst them on the old carpeting, the Shack echoing with yelps and the monotonous pounding of rain on the roof, the cold reminder of the mansion feels miles away.

Huh. Maybe she can do this, she thinks.

* * *

And then _It_  happens again. This time, it's so pitifully innocuous that Pacifica wants to cry.

She and Dipper are meeting Mabel at the new ice cream parlor after working the Shack all morning, a completely innocent activity. Mabel's just finished her lifeguard shift with Grant, the boy she's been going on about for weeks now, and Pacifica's actually looking forward to hearing Mabel's excited accounts of their interactions. There's nothing wrong with this. This should be fun.

Except Dipper opens the door for her and there's a high-pitched, tinkling sound –  _that never-ending tinkling_ – and it doesn't matter whether she knows it's just the small, harmless bell the owners have placed on the door or not, because she's already gone rigid, limbs locking as she's doused in icy panic. The world seems to speed up and slow down at the same time, her mind bringing unwanted memories in front of her, and for a moment she's twelve again, standing in huge, dark hallways with her head bowed, cowering back as  _that stupid bell_  draws nearer, and-

"Oh,  _no_  – crap, Pacifica?"

She can faintly hear Dipper's panicked voice in the distance, and feel gentle, worried hands at her back, but she's too caught up, too far gone to reply-

"Dipper, what's-"

"Bell – at the door – here, we're gonna have to step out for a bit-"

She's pulled gently out of the doorway, back into the blinding sunlight and the sounds of traffic, and the world comes screeching back.

"Crap," Pacifica gasps, sagging in Dipper and Mabel's hold. "Crap – I'm sorry, I'm so sorry-"

"Shh," Mabel says, rubbing her back as they head towards the nearby park. "It's fine, 'cifica. It's not your fault."

Dipper says nothing, but he reaches for her hand and stares ahead, expression tight with suppressed anger.

Mabel directs them to a park bench, and Pacifica collapses on the sun-warmed steel, burying her face in her hands. Seconds later, she feels the familiar weight of Dipper's arm around her, and Mabel's gentle press on her hand.

Neither of them says anything, and Pacifica's eternally grateful for that. They sit there in silence, the happy cries of children and the firm reprimands of mothers reaching them from further in the park.

Pacifica finally raises her head, exhaling heavily.

"Sorry," she mutters.

The twins exchange glances.

"You have literally nothing to apologize for," Dipper says, his hold tightening for a minute, comfortingly.

"I just-" Pacifica bites her lip. "It's that stupid letter, it's bringing everything back."

Mabel rubs her shoulder comfortingly.

"I hate that place," she continues, staring at the ground. "And now it's mine – I don't want it!"

"No one's gonna make you do anything you don't want to, okay?" Dipper says.

"If you don't want to, you never even have to go there," Mabel adds. "You can sell it, or something."

Pacifica thinks of the mansion, dark and stately, and standing lone and regal on the hill. She thinks of the lumberjack's ghost, of the graves, the lives given to build it.

"No," she says, taking a deep breath. "I want to visit. I want it."

She owes them that much.

* * *

She drives up to the mansion in the early morning, alone. A tiny voice inside her tells her she should have brought someone - Dipper and Mabel at the very least – but she is Pacifica Northwest. She has her pride.

She can do this.

She parks the car at the gates, staring up at the overgrown, ornamented doors. A part of her wonders why her parents never bothered to pay for the upkeep of the mansion – the house was their pride and joy, the crowning jewel of the Northwest's string of wealthy houses. It's still a miracle to her, that it survived That Summer.

She takes a breath, swiping the layer of dust off the keypad as she types in the security code. The gates creak open, revealing the achingly familiar lawn inside.

Well, it's not quite as familiar as it once was. The grass has overgrown, the statues are crumbling, and the peacocks are nowhere to be seen. But it's still the lawn she remembers, and the entrance to the mansion is just as extravagant as always.

She swallows, stepping up to the door, and unlocks it with hands that are certainly not shaking, thank you very much. The doors swing open, and Pacifica's greeted by a wave of cold air, smelling of dust and darkness and the faint scent of mahogany.

Tiny clouds of dust erupt from where her shoes press into the carpeting, her mother's favorite silver pattern long worn and faded. The hall is utterly silent – and cold. She shivers, pulling her jacket closer around her. Very cold.

Another deep breath, another step forward. She can see the chandeliers now, their once-glowing lights now dark, the fine tapestries and portraits of her ancestors hanging on the wall, the crystalline windows now foggy with dirt and dust. The darkness in the hall is oppressive, and she stares at the carpet, the silver patterning glaring at her, laughing at her as she remembers her mother, angrily screeching at the mud stains, her father drawing nearer and her cheek stinging and the blaring ringing cutting through her skull-

She staggers back, breath escaping in gasps as the hall is filled with ringing, the incessant tinkling of bells. Pacifica gives the patterning one last, terrified look and her resolve crumbles.

She sprints out of the house, the gates slamming closed behind her with a thunderous boom.

_What_ was she  _thinking._

She locks herself in her room after that, telling herself that it's perfectly fine to have a life plan of sitting in her room with her face buried in a pillow like the coward she is for all eternity.

Unfortunately, her plans to spend the rest of her existence watching trashy comedy shows in her room are interrupted by the reminder that she has incredibly persistent people that care about her far more than she deserves now.

Dipper arrives at noon, let in by her grandmother (the traitor). He stops just outside her locked door, tells her he's here and he's not leaving, and she's pretty sure he's been sitting out there ever since.

It's six in the evening now.

"Go away," she finally calls to him, half-driven mad by the incessant clicking she can hear through the door.

"Nope."

The sheer amount of stubbornness in his voice in unbelievable.

"Just leave," she insists, irritation creeping into her voice. "I'm a big, fat coward and you're wasting your time."

"No, you're not," he says, matter-of-factly. "And no, I'm not."

"I  _want_  you to leave."

"You don't mean that."

(She doesn't. Not ever.)

* * *

Not too long after they got together, Pacifica found herself running her fingers over the sets of four-dot scars on Dipper's arms, half-formed questions she'd always been to afraid to ask on the tip of her tongue. That day, however, Dipper went ahead and answered her questions without prompting.

It was a horrifying story, she remembers thinking. She still thinks.

Dipper's eyes shuttered as he spoke of Bill in halting, tense tones, hands running over the scars on his arms again and again. But despite the obvious pain the story still brought him, he spared no detail. He made sure it was crystal clear his part in the story – his decisions, his mistakes.

Pacifica can remember feeling infinitely glad, watching the haunted look in Dipper's eyes, that Stanley had taken care of Bill permanently. She doesn't like reminders of how many times she'd nearly lost Dipper before she even had the chance to have him.

But it was in that admission, in the quiet moments afterwards when Pacifica was listening to Dipper's heartbeat through his t-shirt, that she found the courage to give an admission of her own.

She'd never spoken –  _truly_  spoken - of her parents to anyone before that. Ever. Telling Dipper was absolutely terrifying.

Thinking back, she can't quite remember why – Dipper is far too faithful, too understanding and too compassionate, to ever leave her over something like that. Nevertheless, the act of actually telling him was one of the hardest things she's ever done in her life.

She's glad she did it, though. Because Dipper's eyes were soft and understanding, not full of the meaningless, shoddy pity she'd been expecting – and sobbing into his shoulder, his arms holding her tightly together, healed something long broken.

Telling Mabel was still hard, but it was… easier. Made her feel lighter. Like she was moving past it, putting herself together.

She'd thought she was over it. She'd thought she was better now, that she could handle this. Thought she was  _braver_  than this.

Apparently not.

Dipper still woke screaming from nightmares when he faced Bill. Dipper was still terrified, so terrified, of what could happen if he got to close when he faced Bill – but he was brave enough to stand up and fight to prevent what inevitably  _would_  happen if the demon won.

And here she is, crumpled letter sitting ignored in her pocket, hands still shaking when she thinks about it.

She's a coward.

* * *

The quiet patter of rain hitting the rooftop echoes through the Shack, mingling with the voices inside. Pacifica stares morosely at the steam wisps rising from her cup of coffee as she sits alone in the kitchen. She can hear Dipper arguing with his great uncle over the pros and cons of rewiring the lighting systems in the living room – and two rooms away, she can hear Mabel's excited tones as she sketches out another potential display for Soos. Their voices are happy and comfortable, even in Stan and Dipper's bickering – they sound like a family. A good one.

Pacifica glares at her coffee cup.

_Coward,_  the steam whispers at her. She sticks her tongue out at the cup.

"That's not a very efficient way to consume coffee, I'm afraid."

Pacifica lets out a tiny shriek as she jumps at the voice. Stanley shows no reaction to her outburst, merely pulling a chair up to the table and sitting across from her. Pacifica swallows, sinking back into her chair as he reaches for the newspaper.

" _\- I'm telling you, Grunkle Stan, you could save so much money in the long run-"_

" _-the long run, ha, I want my money now, kid-"_

Neither of them reacts to the voices floating from the other room. Stanley remains silent and serious as ever as he flips through the papers. Pacifica remains frozen in her seat, avoiding his gaze and staring desperately at her cooling cup of coffee.

"You're not a coward, you know."

Pacifica nearly shrieks again at his low voice. She leans back in her chair, heart beating rapidly as she processes his words.

"H- huh?" she stutters.

"You," Stanley says, eyes still on the paper. "Are not a coward."

"B-begging your pardon, sir," Pacifica says quietly. "But I think you've got too high an opinion of me."

"Of course I don't," Stanley says evenly. "I don't make assumptions in my opinions of people. And anyone who charges a werewolf to save her friends is no coward."

Pacifica flushes.

"It's not the same," she murmurs.

Stanley finally looks at her, raising an eyebrow.

"No?" he says. "Even if that girl is the same one that willingly admitted her family's failures, at the risk of her own reputation?"

"Look, it's just not the same-"

"No, I suppose it's not," Stanley interrupts her. "In my experience, though, courage is courage, even if it is merely the potential to be so still unused."

And with that, he folds the paper neatly, standing and nodding to her as he walks out.

"Miss Northwest."

Pacifica gapes at his retreating back, hands clutched loosely around her untouched coffee. She shakes her head, digesting what he's said.

She frowns.  _Wait. How did he – how did he even_ know  _all that?_?

She looks back up at Stanley's retreating back with wide eyes. As he turns for towards the living room, she swears she sees a smirk on his face.

He's messing with her, she thinks faintly. She tightens her grip on her coffee cup, staring at the dark liquid.

Maybe she's been acting cowardly. But you know what, she thinks - if  _Stanley Pines_  thinks she's not a coward…

Well, if anyone's right, it's him.

* * *

"You sure you're ready for this?"

She's in front of the mansion gates again, and her stands are still shaking – but this time Dipper and Mabel are by her side, and the world seems much brighter for that.

She nods at Dipper, and he tightens his grip on her hand.

"Alright then!" Mabel says, by far the most cheerful out of the three. "Let's do this!"

Pacifica opens the gates, sparing the lawn only an uncaring glance this time around. She stalks up to the door, holding tightly to the dying embers of her courage as she unlocks the doors.

Stanley Pines thinks she's brave. She is not a coward. She can do this.

The door swings open, and the same gust of cold air sweeps by them. They step in carefully, Dipper and Mabel's heads craning as they look around.

"Home sweet home," she mutters, trying to stifle the shaking in her hands as she tightens her hold on Dipper's. He gives her a brief look of concern. She shrugs it off, moving forwards.

She ignores the patterning beneath her feet as she walks, the dead eyes of the portraits following her. She stutters to a halt in front of her great-grandfather's visage, the similarities between him and her father reminding her of _families_  and _legacies_  and  _like father, like daughter-_

She freezes, heart hammering in her chest as her fists clench tighter. There are too many memories here, too many emotions in the dark corridors, she can't do this-

_Poof._

The portrait in front of her explodes with glitter, the sparkling flecks of pink and purple coating the paper entirely.

"Ta-da!"

Pacifica gapes at the now-glittering portrait. She can hear Dipper tensing besides her.

"Mabel…"

"What?" her beaming friend says innocently. "That thing was depressing! It needed some glitter!"

Dipper's still staring at her incredulously when something inside Pacifica snaps.

"Paz?" Dipper asks, hesitantly. "You okay?"

Pacifica's stifled snorts burst into honest laughter as she stares at the bedazzled portrait of her great-grandfather, Mabel's happy giggles joining hers soon after. Dipper sighs, shaking his head, but she can sense his smile through her tears of mirth.

"I'm fine," she gasps as the laughter recedes. "I'm really, really fine."

She stares at the glittering portrait, the dreary visage of her grandfather now drastically altered by Mabel's hand. She takes deep breath, glancing back at the ballroom.

She takes the memory of a ringing bell and overshadows it with Dipper's laughter as he grinds mud into the carpet.

She smiles.

"Let's go find that piano."


End file.
